


the darling buds

by forochel



Category: Day6 (Band)
Genre: Canon Universe, Character Study, M/M, POV Multiple, Soulmates, Trope Subversion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:14:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28441470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forochel/pseuds/forochel
Summary: Flowers spontaneously appear at an average of two times in most people's lives.The first time: at some point in a baby's infancy, around the same time object permanence developed. Usually babies were found with flowers surrounding them (or in their mouths, scaring more than a few parents) or rolling around happily, grabbing onto the petals, discovering allergies, etc etc. For particularly small flowers there was the danger of inhalation.--In a world where soulmate flowers exist, but tend to be signs that bloom slowly over time and arrive unpredictably, Wonpil's have never manifested.
Relationships: Kang Younghyun | Young K/Kim Wonpil
Comments: 6
Kudos: 48





	the darling buds

**Author's Note:**

> **DISCLAIMER: This is a work of FICTION, portraying FICTIONAlised representations of real people. Please turn back now if you know or are anyone in Day6.**
> 
> title is taken from that golden oldie, shakespeare's shall I compare thee to a summer day. this was (a) almost titled *[sweet sweet oboe sounds](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMLSwqAOzHo)*; (b) meant to have been finished in time for, uh, wonpil's birthday (FNAH).

* * *

**SUNGJIN**

After That Thing That Happened, Sungjin took the pains to pay attention to the moods of his bandmates. Subtly. Like a ninja. Nobody really noticed, until he started conducting what Jaehyung had taken to calling Sungjinterventions. Like Sungjin didn't know how to use the fucking English-to-Korean Naver app.

First he had to determine that Wonpil wasn't hungry, or dehydrated, or missing home. Things that were fairly easily fixed. Or Junhyeok. Not fixable at all. Or if a song wasn't coming together well enough. Kind of fixable, it depended. Or if it was because it'd been raining for about a week on end and Wonpil was deep in the sentimentality of the season. Something he'd just leave alone.

But Wonpil's face was still doing that thing — where he looked like he was about two seconds away from collapsing in on himself or crying or something similarly terrible and that Sungjin was in no way emotionally equipped to handle.

Six years into knowing him, this wasn't new. Or particularly worrying, in and of itself. Sad puppy commercials made Wonpil tear up. Thinking about his noona getting married (she'd only just met her soulmate) and moving away from home (she'd _only just met her soulmate_ ) made him tear up. He'd managed to cry a bit watching My Girlfriend is a Gumiho (they'd been educating Jae).

What was making what Sungjin thought of as his growing leader instincts tingle worrisomely, though, was the _frequency_ at which these ... flickers were happening. Kind of like your monitor flashing black randomly and then just up and dying one day

It was a good thing they were roommates, because it made it easier to corner him.

"Wonpil-ah ..." he said one night when Wonpil was in the middle of smacking lotion onto his face. Sungjin'd managed to snag first shower and was already comfortably burrowed into his blankets.

There was no pause in the vigorous application of hydration. "Yeah?"

"Is ... something bothering you?"

Sounding squished, Wonpil asked, "What? No? Why?"

"Well ..." Sungjin thought briefly about taking the coward's way out. But no, he had a job to do here. He steeled himself. "You just, you know, look sadder than usual. Recently. Just wanted to, uh " — a phrase that Minjun-hyung mentioned before helpfully came to mind — "check in."

Wonpil squinted at him. "Hyung, have you been reading leadership manuals again?"

"Yah!" God, what did it take to get a little appreciation around these parts. "I'm serious! You just look, you know. Got anything on your mind? Even if it's just a song ..."

Swivelling all the way in his chair to look at Sungjin properly, Wonpil unexpectedly smiled. It was one of those gentle, sweet things that he sprung on you out of nowhere, and never managed for the cameras despite all that modelling school training.

"I'm fine, hyung, really." Wonpil got up and reached over to drag his folded blanket off the upper bunk, swinging over and around his head and shoulders. "What's up with __you__."

They stared at each other — two people who were entirely too alike when it came to not talking about their problems. Sungjin got the distinct impression this had been a fool's errand.

"I —" Sungjin swallowed hard. How was he going to put this. "Yesterday Jisang-hyung asked me if anything had happened to your parents, you were spacing out so often."

"Oh." Wonpil drew his knees up to his chest. "No. Hmmm. I — Wait, hyung, is this a _Sungjintervention_? Oh my goodness, I'm so honoured!"

Sungjin started throwing a pillow at him, reconsidered, and stuffed it back under his arm. "Where did you learn that word? Do you even know what it means?"

"Of course I do," Wonpil huffed. "I'm not _stupid_."

Opening his mouth and then shutting it again, Sungjin frowned.

"...hyung, I'm not actually offended, you know. It's okay."

"Okay." Sungjin said. "But you know. Okay. Fuck it. You've been looking sad. It is a concern. What is up."

Wonpil stared at him eyes round and face still for a long moment, before he cracked up. "Don't hurt yourself, hyung."

"Yah!"

Sobering a little, Wonpil drew his blanket tighter around his shoulders. "No reason. Honestly. Everyone's always at least a little bit sad."

Silence fell in their room; outside, the night summer rain had become a downpour and beat away at the window next to their bunk bed.

Stirring eventually, Wonpil mused, "It's a lonely season, isn't it? Somehow. The rain makes you feel alone."

"I suppose," said Sungjin. The lights from the building opposite theirs were a fluorescent smear through the wet window when he peered out. He could see where Wonpil was coming from, maybe. "Do you think --" Sungjin hesitated. "-- it's because you don't have, uh, you know?"

"What? A terrible venereal disease?" Wonpil gave him a piercing look, before letting out a burst of laughter. Sometimes Sungjin wished Wonpil wouldn't find him quite so amusing, or that his moods wouldn't change quite so fast.

"You know that's not what I meant, you brat," said Sungjin.

"Yes, but it's so fun to tease you." Wonpil shook his head with a half-smile. "It's not, it really isn't. Don't worry so much, hyung," said Wonpil. "It's just the season changing."

But the look in his eyes was far away again, like he was looking into some alternate dimension. Sungjin wondered what he saw, though to be honest Sungjin also spent half the time wondering what the hell was going on in Wonpil's brain.

"It is," Sungjin agreed reluctantly, feeling as though this conversation was slipping away from him, whatever his original, ill-defined intentions had been.

Wonpil's eyes refocused.

"Aigoo, hyung," he laughed, that particular soft hiccup of a giggle that came out whenever he felt awkward. "Now *you* look sad. It's weird. Stop doing that with your face. It's weird enough on stage."

"I'm trying to be nice," grumbled Sungjin, "and get insulted."

Laughing properly now, Wonpil bent over and slapped his thigh with his palm. "It's just -- your face --!!"

"Okay, fine. We don't have to talk anymore."

Wonpil yawned loudly and got up, dragging his blanket along with him. "That's good, because I want to sleep."

**DOWOON**

Flowers spontaneously appear at an average of two times in most people's lives.

The first time: at some point in a baby's infancy, around the same time object permanence developed. Usually babies were found with flowers surrounding them (or in their mouths, scaring more than a few parents) or rolling around happily, grabbing onto the petals, discovering allergies, etc etc. For particularly small flowers there was the danger of inhalation.

Dowoon's eomma was, for example, very fond of recounting how she had thought baby Dowoon was going to asphyxiate on his soulmate flowers, having found him face down in the constellation of baby's breath that had grown in his crib.

"Holy crap," said Jae-hyung. "And then what happened?"

"I don't know." Dowoon shrugged. "She never bothers continuing the story. But I'm alive and here!"

"It's not a very good system, if you think about it," said Younghyun-hyung in response to Dowoon's anecdote.

"Aren't those the small flowers?" Sungjin-hyung mused. "They always use them in bouquets."

"Yes," said Dowoon. "So I can't ever tell if the flowers have spontaneously appeared because of soulmate magic, or because someone swung their bouquet around really hard or there was a florist delivery scooter accident."

The second (and, conventionally, final) time was when someone found themself in the vicinity of their soulmate. This didn't always have to happen at the first meeting; in the skewed bell curve of soulmate meetings, there was definitely a long tail of people who only realised that they had been in the company of their soulmates for days, weeks, months, or even years after the fact. Or realised that they had been blooming into being soulmates. Or maybe they just never noticed the flowers.

The science of soulmates wasn't very exact.

"Wow," Jae said. "That sucks."

"This," said Younghyun with the persistence of a man who procrastinating on homework for a supply chain course, "is seriously a very inefficient system."

"Noona says a lot of things about nature are not very good systems," Wonpil-hyung, who had been curled into the corner of the sofa and playing a phone game, finally spoke up.

He never paid much attention whenever the conversation meandered to soulmates. Dowoon had wondered when they first met, if this meant that he cared more about not having one than he let on. He still wondered, but this was one of the few things he didn't dare broach with this hyung.

There was a long pause, as everyone tried to think what Wonpil's noona could have been referring to, came to the obvious conclusion, and decided that they weren't really qualified to comment.

"Riiiiiiight, so." Jae visibly cast about for a change in topic. "Right. I mean, nobody expects a randomly flowering cactus to appear in the middle of nowhere, so I'm good, but ... that sucks, Dowoonie, I'm sorry."

"Wait," said Sungjin, "Jaehyungie, did a cactus appear next to you when you were a baby? A spiKY CACTUS?"

"It was in a pot," said Jae serenely. "We don't question the higher workings of divinity."

There was a long pause as everyone absorbed this.

"Does it bother you very much, Dowoonie?" asked Younghyun, to whom divinity was a foreign concept.

"No," Dowoon said simply. "I'm happy to have you all, and my family, and MyDays." And then he cringed so hard his head disappeared between his shoulders and the blanket draped around them. The tips of his ears were red.

He could hear Wonpil cooing, and braced himself. Sure enough, a weight landed atop him.

"Gerroff! Hyung!" Dowoon protested in a squashed and muffled voice.

Cuddling him aggressively, Wonpil said in tones of delight, "Aigoo! Dowoonie! Me too!"

Younghyun-hyung: saviour, weirdly strong, still procrastinating on his coursework, pulled Wonpil off Dowoon, who sat up gasping for breath.

"Nobody wants my love," lamented Wonpil, who had also made off with Dowoon's blanket.

"Nobody wants your _skinship_ ," said Jae, sitting safely on a kitchen chair that he'd dragged into the living room.

Sungjin clarified, before Wonpil could start sulking properly, which no-one ever enjoyed: "Nobody wants you to jump on them out of nowhere."

"So I can jump on you with notice?" Wonpil enquired with an unholy light of interest in his eyes.

"Noboddy is jumping on anyone," Sungjin said repressively.

"I don't mind," said Younghyun mildly, but that was probably because it would serve as a distraction from whatever assignment it was that he was assiduously not doing. And because Wonpil never actually teased him as much as he did the other hyungs.

Wonpil looked severely across the room at Younghyun, who'd had his back turned to his laptop for the past forty-five minutes of discussion. "Hyung, didn't you say you had to finish your assignment by tomorrow or else your classmate would murder you with her pen?"

Younghyun groaned and slid lower in the swivelly chair. "Fiiiiiiiiiine," he grumbled, and squeaked back to the study desk. "I will finish this stupid assignment."

"I'm going to take first shower," announced Dowoon, intuiting that the impromptu gathering was now breaking up.

"Whatever," said Younghyun, who would probably shower at some terrible hour like 4am again and make Jae-hyung shout about a flood coming, again.

Jae shrugged and got off the kitchen chair to return it.

"I wonder," Wonpil said thoughtfully; he hadn't moved from his spot on the sofa, "if you could be soulmates with an inanimate object. Like a shower. I like our shower a lot."

"No!" all of them bellowed: Jae, who was now looking at the kitchen chair in vague anticipatory horror; Sungjin, who looked like he was about to stage an intervention; Younghyun, who had slapped his hands over his ears in self-defence; and Dowoon, because he didn't want to get sidetracked from his shower by another free-wheeling discussion.

Wonpil could be heard laughing to himself even as Dowoon escaped into his bathroom, Younghyun murmuring something in response, too low to make out.

If this hyung could make jokes like that, Dowoon decided, then he really musn't be bothered.

**JAE**

If anyone bothered asking Jae, which — okay, to be fair, they did. He still remembered giving Sungjin a talking-to back when they'd just moved out of their cramped little apartment and Sungjin had been in the last stages of his hyper-paranoid leader Sungjintervention mode.

Where was he? Oh, right.

If anyone bothered asking Jae, he'd say that while soulmates were a gift of nature, the point was what people did with it. His older sister had met her soulmate on a diving trip in the Maldives, and now they kept up a keen correspondence updating each other on their extremely independent and Real Adult Fulfilled lives. Jae suspected that they may or may not have had a _fling_ , but that wasn't really a line of thinking one wanted to pursue about one's sibling. Jae was pretty sure his sister would drop everything, up to but excluding her baby, to fly to the Maldives if her soulmate needed someone to bury a body.

He'd given his two cents to Sungjin back then, when Wonpil had been in one of his muted moods again, which meant Sungjin was squinting suspiciously at him again.

Sungjin had brought it up with Jae when they had been practising their guitar parts together. Jae particularly enjoyed these two-person practices, when he could hear the way their parts interacted, and they played with variations, the little bits of call and answer, the harmonies, the doubling. Sungjin once said something about how it was like sectional practice, which went entirely over Jae's head.

But back to Sungjin's question back then.

"I don't think it's taken away from him at all," Jae had mused, picking out a winding tune. "Think about it: he has so much love to give." Muting his strings with the meat of his palm, he'd added drily, "Maybe sometimes too much."

"No, I don't think it's taken away from Pilie," Sungjin had protested. "I just think ... I don't know."

"You just are really traditional," Jae had said, "Park Sungjin. Lots of people never meet their soulmate or like, you know, they do and it's like whatever. Platonic, right?"

"I know that. But it's just like ... if it were anyone else, maybe it wouldn't be so sad. But this is _Kim Wonpil_. He has so many feelings."

Jae was not too proud to admit he had almost dropped his guitar; he'd laughed so hard at the sheer hypocrisy of Park Sungjin, a man whom legend said had actually cried real Busan namja tears when he and his best friend hadn't managed to get into the same entertainment agency, saying this.

So Sungjin had let the subject drop, and Jae had thought it done and dusted ... only for it all to respawn about one-and-a-half world tours and change later.

"I'm getting really weird déjà vu," Jae said. It was even happening during another _sectional_. "Are you getting really weird déjà vu? Because I am getting really weird déjà vu."

"I didn't know you knew the word in Korean," said Sungjin in waspish tones.

Jae poked Sungjin with a pick. "It's _literally_ the _English word,_ in _Korean_."

There was a pause while Sungjin worked through this. He made a silent _oho_ face.

" _Now_ he gets it," Jae sighed.

"Yah, Jaehyungie, it just means the problem hasn't gone away."

"There _is no problem_." Jae paused. "I mean, there is a problem, but the problem isn't the problem you think the problem is!"

The plasticity of Sungjin's face was a neverending wonder to Jae, considering his inflexibility in many other areas both physical and metaphysical. "I ... am confused."

Jae waved this away; Sungjin would catch up eventually.

"Also, we wrote a whole song — _you_ wrote a whole song! About it! About people who aren't soulmates falling in love!" Jae paused and replayed what he just said in his head. "Wait, oh my god, Park Sungjin, _who were you writing about_?"

Because if Sungjin had been writing a giant not-so-subtle notice to their two bandmates, well. Jae was going to be really mad.

Because if anyone bothered asking Jae, specifically about soulmates and predestination and all that Hallmark romantic bullshit, he'd just point at his two idiot bandmates and flap his arms exasperatedly.

He couldn't even complain about this to any of his friends, because ... confidentiality. That was a thing. Sungjin had thus far seemed determined to ostrich about this until he really had to pay attention. And he was depending on Jae to tell him when he _really_ had to pay attention.

In Jae's opinion, that threshold had been crossed a long time ago.

"He's been doing that for the last ten years, Jaehyungie," Sungjin would sigh whenever Jae tried to point out one (1) Kang Younghyun, Brian's chronic case of heart-eyes escalating. "That's just, like, Kangbra's face."

"AND THAT DOESN'T TELL YOU ANYTHING???" Jae would try his best not to screech. It always came out as a hoarse scream instead, and would prompt Sungjin to try and force one of his horrible traditional medicinal concoctions down Jae's throat.

This time, Sungjin strummed thoughtfully at his guitar.

"I don't know, I was just imagining," he said eventually. "I read a short story. Wonpilie recommended it to me, actually."

"Oh?" Jae straightened up. " _Wonpilie_ recommended it?"

"Kind of pointed, come to think of it."

"Did Wonpil _recommend it_ as _some kind of hint_?"

"To stop being, how did you put it, so goddamn traditional?" Sungjin gave Jae an unduly wry look. "Maybe."

"But what if he was also _trying to tell you something_?"

Just the other night, when Wonpil had stolen a bite off Younghyun's fork, Younghyun had _let him_ without fussing. Then Wonpil had looked mildly disappointed; Younghyun teased him about just deserts; Wonpil started talking more nonsense and the whole while they'd been _smiling at each other all gooey-eyed_ and — and Jae _knew_ Sungjin had _witnessed this too_ , because Sungjin had been collecting his laundered bedsheets. They had _made meaningful_ , _(dead)-eye contact_ with each other across the space between the laundry balcony and the kitchen.

Sungjin squinted at him. Jae dared to hope.

"Well, isn't it sadder then, because Wonpilie doesn't —" Sungjin cut himself off and sighed. "We really shouldn't be gossipping about our members' lives."

Jae zipped his concert hoodie all the way up to the top of the hood and screamed into the thick black fabric.

**YOUNGHYUN**

Cabin fever struck at some point in the recording process, and he'd volunteered to "Go walk Wonpilie before Sungjin-hyung murders him".

Wonpil had opened his mouth, forehead furrowing, but then Younghyun had already been pulling him, sling bag and all, out of the studio, up into the light and cool spring breeze, carrying with it the usual city smells and a hint of freshness from the river running beyond all the tall buildings.

"Fine," Wonpil had said then, face smoothing into coolness, and turned west for the closest towpath.

Younghyun, set off-balance, had hurried to catch up.

He hadn't ... been expecting anything other than their usual comfortable camaraderie; it certainly hadn't been this: walking in a silence that seemed serene on Wonpil's part, but was uncertain on Younghyun's.

"I'm not your pet dog," Wonpil said evenly when they paused in a quiet green pocket along the river, under a stand of profusely blossoming trees. "I don't need to be walked."

Younghyun blinked at him, bottom falling out of his stomach. He hadn't thought — "Ah, Pilie, I was only joking, of course you aren't —"

"I just wish you'd," Wonpil started, drew in a deep breath and then let it out long and low.

Younghyun was about to ask him what he wished, what he wanted from Younghyun, when both their phones buzzed. He would have ignored it, but Wonpil slid his phone out of his pocket, conscientious as ever.

"Oh. They don't need us anymore." Wonpil looked up and smiled a little, before folding himself down onto the grass. "Jaehyungie-hyung is terrorising Sungjin-hyung about how exactly to sing his song, apparently. Dowoonie is terrified for his turn."

Now _thoroughly_ unfooted, Younghyun haplessly sat down as well and tried laughing. "Does he need rescuing?"

"No, he needs to learn," said Wonpil, very obviously trying to pull mischief on over whatever strange mood had taken him. "And —"

Younghyun caught him by the elbow impulsively; Wonpil's mouth snapped shut. He turned to look at Younghyun, eyes wide. "Wonpil-ah, I _am_ sorry."

"Oh." Wonpil blinked rapidly, his cheeks squishing into an embarrassed smile. "Oh, it's okay hyung, we don't have to —"

Shaking his head as well as Wonpil's arm, Younghyun insisted, "No, I was — I'm sorry I hurt your feelings or made you feel like I was treating you like a ... a pet dog."

Wonpil shrugged, his smile smoothing out into opacity. "It's fine. I know I get overexcited sometimes. It's a fair comparison. What else can I be?"

Younghyun opened his mouth, found himself speechless. This was entirely out of the blue: the gift of Wonpil's honesty about the soft, vulnerable parts of himself that he usually hid away under smiles and deflecting pranks. Suddenly he _really, direly_ wanted to know what Wonpil had been about to say to him earlier.

Casting around for an answer that wouldn't be too scouringly honest, his eyes landed on the clusters of pink and white that dotted the grass. He was probably sitting on some right now.

"A spring flower!" Younghyun declared hastily, unthinkingly. "Like a cherry blossom."

His unthinking babble shocked a laugh out of Wonpil, honest and loud. Younghyun felt his heart trip over, lurching like a drunkard.

"Are you saying I'm going to die young, hyung? Live a short, beautiful life?"

"No!" Younghyun gave him a horrified look. "And anyway, cherry blossoms are part of a whole tree, not just. The tree doesn't die."

"This is getting very scientific." Wonpil pressed his lips together, but the twitching corners of his mouth gave him away.

"You're laughing at me," accused Younghyun.

"I am," Wonpil agreed, and burbled over with giggles at Younghyun's expense.

Younghyun paused, and then decided he'd take Wonpil's merriment over whatever that had been, before. He checked his phone for any updates while Wonpil had his giggle fit, texted the others back to acknowledge the change in schedule.

He looked back up to find that Wonpil had calmed down and was now watching the river flow past absently.

"Are we ..." Younghyun started hesitantly. "Are we okay now?"

"Hmmm?" Wonpil cast him an absent sidelong glance. "Oh. Yes, of course. It's just ..." he smiled, faraway and a little nostalgic. "You made me remember about ... when I was small, my halmeoni used to call me a spring blossom. She felt bad about, you know."

Heart hurting a little, the way it did whenever Wonpil deigned to talk about — or talk around — or even mention his soulmate situation, Younghyun scooped a blossom off the grass. It was a little raggedy around the edges, the edges of one petal torn. There was a certain sadness to cherry blossoms, yes, but they came back every spring. And the sight of them in full fluorescence was enough to last a body a whole year.

"Don't laugh at me," said Younghyun, going with his gut, "but I think it's fitting."

Some emotion flickered in Wonpil's eyes when their gazes met. His face had gone watchfully still; he was almost frowning. Younghyun had talked in public, before, about how much he liked the way Wonpil smiled; how bright he looked, then. But that was because Wonpil unmoving, unsmiling, was a kind of terrible loveliness that felt so untouchably remote.

Words failed Younghyun.

He bounced the pale peach blossom in his palm once, twice, and then reached out to Wonpil, intending to tuck it behind its ear.

Wonpil's hand shot out, grip surprisingly strong on Younghyun's forearm. "What are you doing?"

Falling back on the obvious in the absence of any actual reason, Younghyun said, "Putting a flower in your hair."

An expectant silence followed. Of course, Wonpil was expecting him to follow up with some plausible reason like: for a selca, for the fans, but Younghyun couldn't, really, not when this was selfishly for himself.

"A flower for a flower," Younghyun continued. He was running entirely on instinct now, the way he best operated.

Wonpil, unexpectedly, went pink: the apples of his cheeks, his tips of his ears.

"Hyung," he said almost gently, "you're talking nonsense."

"Not to me," Younghyun said nonsensically.

Wonpil pushed his arm away and frowned properly this time, drawing his knees to his chest. It was, Younghyun realised with a sinking feeling, the thing he did, whenever he wanted to feel secure.

" _Hyung_ ," he said reproachfully. His eyes, when they met Younghyun's for a brief, heartstopping moment, were dark and wide. "Stop. Stop it, whatever you're playing at. I don't like this kind of teasing. We're not on air or anything."

"I'm not teasing, Wonpil-ah." Younghyun dropped his arm. This really wasn't where he'd expected this walk to take them, but, well. He'd take the opportunity if it presented itself. It wasn't like Wonpil had walked away yet, or apologised, or said _no I don't feel the same way_. "I know it's just us. I'm serious."

Wonpil gaped at him, and then — and then he buried his face in his arms, crossed over his knees, for a long moment. The breeze ruffled the little hairs at the nape of his neck. Younghyun watched his back expand and subside several times, fidgeting in place as he tried to be patient.

Eventually, Wonpil emerged.

"But ..." Wonpil bit his lip, eyes wavering as he searched for words. " _You_ have one, hyung, don't you? A soulmate. Chrysanthemums, you mentioned before."

Younghyun understood, all at once, what Wonpil was afraid of. That he'd only ever be a temporary, transient feature in someone else's life. That anyone he gave his heart to would eventually slip through his fingers, once they found their soulmate. Or that someone would decide he was deficient or something, or too weird. Because that's all they'd ever been told, growing up in Korea. The teleology of soulmates. The natural order of things. Jae yelled angrily about it a lot.

"I do, but it doesn't matter."

"Yes it does." Wonpil said, dropping his hand to fist in the jacket he was sitting on. "It matters to you. It always matters."

"We're just friends," said Younghyun. "Wonpil-ah..."

"Wait, you've already met yours?"

Younghyun squinted, confused. "Yes, in ... I don't recall. One of the times I moved schools. After I went to Toronto to study, it became obvious it wouldn't be romantic. You've met her — my chingu who came to our concert in Daegu. Wait. _Wait_. You never realised?"

Wonpil looked exasperated and blew his cheeks out.

"I can never tell. How does anyone tell? It's stupid. It's not like people walk around sprouting flowers when they're in their soulmates' presence. My noona just shouts a lot when she's with her soulmate."

Having met both Wonpil's noona and her soulmate, Younghyun couldn't suppress the smile. They were the kind of soulmates who would shout each other into being better people, and nobody would be able to tell if they were just family or also lovers.

A look stole over Wonpil's face, his eyes glazing over as his mind went far away to whichever plane of surrealism he got his ideas from. "Wait, hyung, oh no, what if you have allergies? What if Jae-hyung finds his soulmate in spring, but he keeps sneezing, so then he can't see because he's crying, and then --"

"Wonpil-ah!" Younghyun laughed and slapped his palms to Wonpil's face. "Focus on me, don't turn Jae's life into a drama."

Wonpil blinked hard and snapped back. He looked a little stunned to find his face sandwiched between Younghyun's hands, and broke their eye contact, wrenching his face to the side.

"How did you find out? Why didn't you ever say?" Wonpil played with the young grass next to his knee. Like he wasn't convinced that Younghyun wasn't just making up a story so he could, what, love and leave Wonpil?

"I didn't realise I never ... told the story. We were on a school trip, to the seaside," said Younghyun. "We went to go look at seaweed, we were making jokes about the seaweed, and then some just .... appeared. It was out of season, and ... chrysanthemums don't grow on _sand_."

"Huh."

"Yeah, they were also white and gold, so she just laughed and said I must've known she got rejected recently."

Wonpil blinked at him, obviously diverted. "That's so sad. Poor noona. Weren't you in elementary school?"

"What, twelve year olds can't confess?" Younghyun smiled at him. "If it makes you feel better, they're also the flower of the Japanese royal family."

"I guess you can be pretty princely. In photoshoots."

"Uh-huh, _Princess_ Wonpil?" he said teasingly.

"Ugh." Wonpil rolled his eyes. "Forget that radio show."

"Too late, I've changed your contact name in my phone."

"What!" Wonpil squawked, and made a grab for Younghyun's phone. "No! I don't like it, hyung!"

Since Wonpil was so conveniently stretched over his lap, trying to swipe away the phone lying on the farther side of Younghyun from him, Younghyun took the opportunity to tuck the cherry blossom, now a little worse for the wear, into his hair.

Wonpil froze. Retreated without his prize. Frowned at him. Whoever said Wonpil was pliant and easygoing was ... both right and wrong.

"It suits you. It really does." Younghyun tried to keep the nervousness out of his voice. "Your season, right?"

"Hyung, you know I don't have a soulmate." Wonpil worried at his fingers, gaze cast down. "Not even a friend one, not like you. Apparently."

This was the longest Younghyun had ever heard Wonpil talk about soulmates. They'd all thought he didn't care, that he, in his odd Wonpilie way. had removed himself so far from the discourse and conventional narratives he was above it all. Which was stupid, come to think of it; of all of them, Wonpil loved stories and romance and what better romantic trope was there than the soulmate narrative? Of all of them, who wouldn't ache to love and be loved more than Wonpil? Of all of them, who had been told over and over by his classmates' whispers; by well-meaning strangers; by so much of his beloved art, that he was missing something fundamental to the romantic experience?

"You're enough," Younghyun said quietly, watching Wonpil's face, "by yourself."

Wonpil's expression cracked and he made a wounded sound — Younghyun wasn't even sure if Wonpil was conscious of it.

As the tears welled up in Wonpil's eyes, Younghyun was suddenly very conscious of the fact that they were in public. This _was_ a secluded, unpopulated part of the green strip that ran along the Han, but still ... in public. Exposed. Telephoto lenses could still — oh, jesus, he was an idiot.

"Okay, okay." He pat Wonpil on the back. "Let's, uh, let's go back home? We can talk more there..."

Wonpil sniffled, followed Younghyun's meaningful glance about the area, and nodded.

He noted with hope that Wonpil accepted his hand up, even if he shook the flower out of his hair.

The journey back was quiet. Wonpil was now withdrawn, quiet like the sea after a night storm, with unknowable tides towing under that solemn, blank mask. After all this time, Younghyun knew well enough to let him alone; the ball now lay squarely in Wonpil's court, and there would be no hurrying him along. At least, Younghyun told himself again, there had been no outright _no_.

With Wonpil now padding along docilely next to him, still faintly tearstained and in a daze of deep thought, though, Younghyun was pretty sure that the ajumma in the convenience store they stopped in to get snacks for everyone thought he'd been bullying Wonpil and was now making up for it with convenience store snacks. If the dirty judgmental look she gave him was anything to go by.

Having barely escaped unscathed, Younghyun opened his mouth and turned to Wonpil to joke about it. But Wonpil didn't seem to have noticed at all, and was only absently thumbing at the smooth plastic handle of the bag Younghyun had passed to him. Younghyun watched him at it for a little bit, before nudging him. He tilted his head towards their building, now just within sight, when Wonpil jumped and looked up.

"Home soon," Younghyun said, and attempted a smile.

The tight, tiny bud of hope he'd been both nursing and trying to temper loosened a little, when Wonpil glanced quickly away and nodded; he'd gone faintly pink again.

They were walking past the hole-in-the-wall that they sometimes got jokbal delivery from — even though it was only two streets away from their building — when the thought occured to Younghyun.

"Hey, Wonpilie, do you want sikhye?"

Wonpil slowed in step with Younghyun, looking blankly up. Younghyun pointed with his thumb towards the jokbal place — the best kept secret about it was the homemade sikhye, really.

Wonpil shook his head, smiled a wobbly thing. "You don't have to bribe me or anything, hyung."

"I'm not bribing you." Younghyun dared to reach out and shake Wonpil's shoulder a little. "I'm just saying, we're outside and not at work, for once."

"..." Wonpil's eyelashes dipped as he glanced down and back up again. "Okay."

Wonpil waited outside while Younghyun went in to place the order.

He sipped on his sikhye all the way back home, a faint smile around the straw, sunshine in Younghyun's chest.

In the lift on the way up to their flat, they were alone, but Wonpil pressed close along his side. Younghyun was about to say something when Wonpil linked their pinkies together. Younghyun glanced down at him, reeling.

Ah, he was so cute, determinedly staring at a spot on the floor so that all Younghyun could see was his mop of unstraightened hair, his red ears, the fan of his lashes dark against the tops of his pink cheeks.

"Wonpil-ah," he whispered.

There was a hesitant pause. Still staring at probably the pink hexagonal tile, Wonpil said, "Mmmm?"

Younghyun thought about it and then smiled to himself; this would be the most fitting, he thought. "Thank you."

**WONPIL**

Nobody had ever talked about his flowers to him. Not for the first four years of his life, until he had to go to kindergarten.

He didn't know if they didn't know how, or thought — oh, maybe they're just late, until it was too late, too late to explain away as anything other than the stark truth: "Wonpilie, my love, you don't have flowers. You don't have one." And then, because his halmeoni and his parents and his noona all loved him very much: "But it's okay, because you're our spring blossom anyway."

He'd waited a little longer, himself, with some childish faith that maybe one day he'd wake up and his bed, which was surrounded by boards on three sides and had a net on the fourth like a ship, would be filled with flowers: sweet-smelling and soft against his skin. Back then he hadn't thought about thorns that might give you scars or pollen that might choke you; he hadn't thought about razor-sharp leaves or stinging sap.

He'd waited through elementary school, smiling through childish curiosity and cruelty, and decided in the crush of collapsing disappointment as he left his elementary school gates for the last time, to stop waiting.

"Aigoo," his halmeoni said, when he unlocked the front door and went into the kitchen, put his arms around her and pushed his face into her side. He could hide from the world for a while here, he was sure. Hide for as long as it took to push the tears back down. "Aigoo," his halmeoni said again, "Are you sad, Wonpilie?"

Wonpil shook his head, and then nodded. His halmeoni smelt, as she always did, comfortingly of soya sauce, of simmering, savoury broth and the sharp herbaceous tang of medicinal oil for her joints.

"You'll still be with your friends next year, won't you?"

Wonpil nodded.

His halmeoni was silent for a while. Then there was the metallic clang of her ladle being set down, and she was hugging him and stroking his hair.

"It'll be all right, Wonpilie," she told him. "It'll be all right."

And it was, mostly. There wasn't any other way for it to be, after all. Wonpil picked himself up and decided that it would all turn out all right in the end, because he had his halmeoni's love and his parents and his noona. He also had his close-knit group of friends, who all certainly knew he didn't have his flowers, but never prodded him about it.

In middle school, right after passing auditions, Wonpil learnt about platonic soulmates. One of his oldest friends, from kindergarten even, confessed to everyone else that he thought he didn't love his soulmate the way everyone said he should. And then someone else talked about an auntie who didn't either; that she was best of friends with her soulmate, and that they lived together, but not _lived together_ lived together.

"Sounds nice," was Wonpil's contribution. "Friendship's a kind of love too, isn't it?"

Being teenaged boys, even of the artsier bent, everyone made throaty noises of mock-disgust amidst general agreement.

"So maybe," someone said sleepily even later into that already late night, "maybe it's that way for you too, Wonpilie."

There was a hiss and a thump and a loud _ow_!

Wonpil, floating on the cusp of sleep, felt a swell of painful fondness for his group of friends. "I don't think so," he said to the dark room, warm with bodies clustered together on mothball-smelling yo. "I don't even have flowers, remember?"

"Well—" someone else started, and was cut off with another thump. Wonpil wondered who his thump-giving defender was.

"Anyway," said Wonpil with some finality, turning over onto his side, "I'm going to be a trainee soon, so I'll be too busy to think about all that."

He _was_ too busy, and too exhausted to think about all that, once he started training. There was school, and then busing across cities to Cheongdam-dong, and still homework and practice and — it was impossible to avoid entirely; the notion of soulmates was so woven into the social fabric. Even the songs he practised the basic dance moves to alluded to soulmates. But that was in the general; ambient noise Wonpil was already used to.

Time passed; Wonpil grew. He got more practised at letting this formless, aimless yearning roll through him. It always passed.

And then what helped: the earth-shattering notion of people having to _work at it_ , like whatever mystical forces bound two people together only served as a spark. He only had to look at the conflagration-in-waiting that was a particular pair of his fellow trainees. What helped more, perversely: the sad realisation that all this soulmate magic was some kind of draw that wasn't necessarily — healthy, or good. One's teenaged years were guaranteed to be tumultuous anyway, but waiting to discover your soulmate seemed to make things _worse_ , in Wonpil's view.

He watched as a friend got his heart broken; a labelmate had a breakdown because her soulmate was not, not someone she could live with. Maybe it was better this way, Wonpil decided. That he got to decide and choose for himself.

The problem, of course, was always going to be whether people let him choose _them_.

"I feel like you're just playing a part —"

"— sorry, it's just ... I think we aren't —"

"— sorry, you're so busy and actually I ... I met —"

Sorry, sorry, sorry.

In the end, Wonpil decided it was too much effort on top of _everything else_ on his fucking plate. Music was _much easier to deal with_ : listening to it; learning it; making it. He could just mine the romantic travails of his friends and bandmates for inspiration. It wasn't like Wonpil suffered from some deficit of empathy, anyway. He got a tattoo to remind himself of his decision; that no matter what, he had his silly, beating heart that was as capable as any other of love and hurt and fellow feeling.

And then there was the convenient excuse of their dating ban, to not have to think about it. To shut off this avenue of possibility.

So it took a while to cotton on, really.

When did the slow creep of attraction overtake his better sense? When did he let himself acknowledge that the tingling in his fingertips and the strange, grainy buzz that filled up the space under his sternum, the flip of his stomach whenever he accidentally locked gazes with one particular bandmate — a person _he lived_ with — didn't mean that he was having a stroke or that he might have some chronic illness or acid reflux?

He made the mistake of asking Jae once, reasoning that someone who'd been as poorly as this hyung growing up must be familiar with strange physical symptoms.

Jae, upon ascertaining that Wonpil wasn't having some kind of bizarre low-grade persistent anxiety attack, squinted at him. As usual, that face made Wonpil crack up.

"Yah!" Jae snapped. "Are you dying or not?"

"I don't know, hyung, that's why I'm asking you."

"Well, be more serious if you think you're dying."

"But your _face_."

Jae shook his head, a reluctant smile twitching his lips. Wonpil pressed his lips together desperately. "Aish, you brat. You're not ... you know what, I'm not telling you. You can figure it out for yourself." And then snickering, Jae put his massive gaming headphones back over his ears and ignored Wonpil's protests and whacks.

Sungjin-hyung eventually came along to drag Wonpil away, in any case — "Please don't break Jaehyungie," he said in that particularly long-suffering way, "we need our lead guitarist."

So: Wonpil wasn't sure. It crept up on him, seeped in through the cracks.

He'd thought, at first, that it was just fun, easy flirtation; the cheap thrill of having an attractive man's attention on him, even if at least 75% of it was teasing that would've made someone not Wonpil explode. Apparently.

"Seriously," Jinyoungie had said once — twice — _many times_ , "how you don't just punch him in the side like you do with everyone else, I don't know."

He did his best to monitor Wonpil's _things_ as much as Wonpil tried watching all of GOT7's shows. It was always funny, in any case, to see how Jinyoungie's idol image got tested on shows. Younghyun always said, admiringly, that it seemed like his was shellacked on, whenever their band failed miserably at trying to maintain their image training. Such as it was. Wonpil was convinced they received half as much as _on average_ as anyone else, and that was because Dowoonie and Jae-hyung dragged down the mean.

"You remember all that maths?" Younghyun-hyung had asked once when Wonpil was theorising at him during a composing break. "Impressive."

From anyone else it would have been snide, condescending. From Younghyun it had sounded like he really was half-impressed, like he didn't remember any of it and that's why he was impressed, even though Wonpil knew for a fact he had to have much more maths than Wonpil. That sincerity, the indulgence cut with Younghyun's reflexive archness, all precision designed to seep through the chinks in Wonpil's subconscious armour.

"It's not that annoying," Wonpil had said to Jinyoung, confused. "Or maybe it is for a bit, but it's also funny? Bri-hyung's stupid." He paused for thought. "But also smart."

Jinyoungie had levelled a _look_ at him. "He's stupid. Who needs three names?"

And then Wonpil had tried to explain the reasoning there, which he only kind of understood himself, got mostly tangled up in his reinterpretation, and then, frustrated, blown out a breath. "Why are we talking about this? Can we talk about Dowoonie getting stuck on a wall? It was so cute. Did you know people in his school thought he was a cool sunbae? I don't get it _at all_."

"Didn't Bri-hyung help him get down? I think I saw that. Jaebeom-hyung thought Sungjin-hyung was hilarious. Someone else sent it to him."

In retrospect, Wonpil would admit that he'd felt some snaking jealousy, back then. Not enough to climb up onto some rickety stone wall, himself, but — it had been there, like an adder in the pit of his stomach, underneath the amusement and layers of fondness he felt so deeply for his bandmates.

So — the question of when. When Wonpil had realised he'd fucked himself over.

Perhaps it had been more of a series of tiny little epiphanies, an accretion of _oh, yes, this one — oh shit_.

Seemingly innocuous moments that damned Wonpil in the end: looking up from a bowl of home-made pasta; getting teased into shy distraction because Younghyun knew how much he hated that bleach job; _literally_ running into him late at night outside the bathroom, in the middle of rehearsal, in the middle of a concert; looking up from trying to remember dance moves into his stupid fansite-aping phone camera; the unsteadying weight of an arm around his shoulders; the way this hyung's entire face just crumpled with fondness in front of what seemed like all of instagram when he crashed Younghyun's insta live.

Wonpil had developed the ability to roll with things a long time ago, including feelings that made him wish he could hide in his halmeoni's side again. That made him suspect not even that old, long-gone comfort might not help so much anymore. This was not a friendship he wanted to risk, nor one he could _bear_ to risk. Younghyun, after all, had grown up alone and now of course burst with affection; he had learnt to give and give so that he would get back; he had gone to Canada and absorbed strange ideas and now reacted in strange ways, so that Wonpil sometimes found his behaviour hard to orient against.

He was, and it could be the only truth, the sort of friend that was irreplaceable. He also had a soulmate portended by chrysanthemums out there somewhere, and Wonpil found it inconceivable that they wouldn't love Younghyun the way he deserved.

The only way, he knew, was through. And if he had to live like this, with this impossible yawning ache in his chest, with the surges of acid desire that would course through him at unpredictable intervals, with wanting and not wanting all in the same heartbeat ... then so be it. He had no choice but to. Part of him hoped getting yelled at in the army would just deaden him inside.

"That," said Jihyunie, "is a very long horizon."

Wonpil pet one of the slinky siamese cats winding its way around him, its tail waving proudly in the air. He pulled his face mask further down so he could talk without lipping at the stiff white edge of it. "Two years? Not even that, anymore. We'll live for a long time. That isn't much in comparison."

"Yeah, and how long have you been living like this?"

He slipped his hands under the cat's belly and pulled her, meowing in question but otherwise pliant, into his lap. As a perfect exemplar of catness, she immediately loafed. "Oh, shut up."

So it genuinely, really, one hundred percent took him off-guard when Younghyun tried putting a fucking flower in his hair after comparing him to a spring blossom.

Calling Wonpil perfect or cute or _whatever_ on public broadcast was one thing — that was entertainment. A performance.

This, though. What the actual fuck?

If this was Younghyun's way of trying to apologise for hurting Wonpil's feelings — even though Wonpil's feelings had only been hurt because of _himself_ , his own moment of weak resentment, at yet another bit of evidence stacking up in the _he only thinks of you as a cute puppy_ column — if this was Younghyun's thoughtless way of trying to apologise, then Wonpil. Wonpil didn't know what to do.

He couldn't help the recoil, and then everything after that had the hazy, oversaturated quality of a lucid dream. Even when they got up, Younghyun's hand hard and calloused under Wonpil's own, and started heading back to the dorm.

Everything had happened so fast; Wonpil had felt like he'd really been playing a part, like he'd been talking and bantering and laughing from outside his body, like he'd been floating. Like his soul had only snapped back into place when he'd heard the words he'd wanted to hear so badly for such a long time. _You're enough_. Just Wonpil.

But he had to readjust to this new reality, and so dumbly followed on beside Younghyun. Younghyun, who was always so patient and kind, who was indulgent and humoured him, who rarely — never? _never_ properly lost his patience with Wonpil. Who laughed with him more than at him, and who said Wonpil was like a flower, just like everyone else who ever loved Wonpil, and who _liked Wonpil back_.

Wonpil was too old for this juvenile fluttering in his belly. The juvenile fluttering in his belly didn't care. It fluttered harder when Younghyun bought him sikhye. Fluttered all the way back into their building lobby and the lift. He glanced up at Younghyun out of the corner of his eye, once the doors closed on them. Younghyun was — and Wonpil could admit this to him now — as he usually was, already looking back. This did not help with the fluttering.

Turning hurriedly away, Wonpil shuffled closer. Close, close, until Younghyun was a solid wall of sunlight pressed up against him in this metal box. Their arms were pressed together; their hands knocking together. The swoop low in his belly, Wonpil would attribute to the motion of the lift. What he did next, he had no excuse for: only that he wanted to.

Linking pinkies made the swooping low in his abdomen intensify. Under his ribs was a terrified bubbling hope; he didn't want to feel happy but — out of the corner of his eye, where he was staring fixedly at the far edge of the tiled floor where it met the lift doors, he caught the motion of Younghyun looking down at him, surprised. He could hear his heartbeat in his ears, loud _da-dum da-dum_ s. He didn't dare look up.

This felt like the longest lift ride in the world. Somehow, there was enough time for Younghyun to huff out a low laugh, shot through with that particular note that made Wonpil turn shy (shyer) in front of cameras and off. Enough time Younghyun to turn their palms together, sliding their fingers together in a quick clasp, like when they did their bows at the end of a concert. But now — there was no audience, no sense of relief. Just the same rush of adrenaline, teetering over the edge of a cliff.

"Wonpil-ah," Younghyun said. The sound of his voice slid down Wonpil's spine, leaving weakness in its wake.

Voiceless, wordless, Wonpil managed a questioning hum.

Ridiculously, Younghyun continued: "Thank you."

"What?" burst out of Wonpil.

Younghyun grinned at him. "Thank you, I said."

"I —" Wonpil started.

The lift doors opened; Younghyun tugged him out.

"I —"

Younghyun keyed in their door code and pulled him through to the hyeongwan.

"I — I — " Wonpil stuttered, when Younghyun reached over his shoulder to push the door shut, and stayed there, caging him in with one arm.

"You?" asked Younghyun, warm and soft; but his eyes were — this was why Wonpil couldn't ever look at him for too long.

Wonpil felt his eyes try to skitter away, and held Younghyun's gaze with great effort. "I ... like you too, hyung." Then, mortified beyond belief, he half-screamed and tried to hide in his hands, entirely forgetting that Younghyun had one captive.

Laughing again, Younghyun caught him in a hug, tucking Wonpil's face into his neck.

"Wonpilie," he said _right into Wonpil's ear_ , "you are so fucking adorable."

In an attempt to gain some control, Wonpil turned his face just enough that his mouth wasn't mashed uncomfortably against Younghyun's collarbone. Just enough to be able to say, "So you adore me?"

The fingers cradling the base of his head tightened briefly, slid around to cup his jaw. Before he could stop it, Wonpil let out a tiny sound at the molten look in Younghyun's eyes, when his face was tilted up.

"H-hyung?" Wonpil whispered, anticipation quickening his pulse, as Younghyun's face got _closer and closer_.

"I" — Younghyun was now murmuring against Wonpil's lips; his lips were a little chapped from the wind; he smelt faintly of the jokbal shop and his winter berry cologne; his breath was warm — "really fucking adore you, Pilie."

Wonpil swallowed hard, barely managed to get out a squeaky " _oh_ ", before he was being properly, thoroughly kissed; Younghyun pressing his advantage while Wonpil was still collecting himself, with all the intensity of someone trying to prove his point.

Dizzily, Wonpil decided that all the questions he still had: the _whens_ and _whys_ and _how_ s could wait; for now, he was going to let the the blooming elation wash the old ache in his chest away.

✿ ✿ ✿

**Author's Note:**

> I started conceptualising this (sort of) PRECISELY on March 25th of this decade-long year — my email to bysine literally says _except wonpil doesn't have a soulmate, because [mechanism uninvented as of yet]_ — got stuck at some point (with Sungjin, specifically), and back-burnered this until I suddenly had a breakthrough earlier in the month. 
> 
> And here we are at the finish line, finally, with much thanks to bysine and the word nerd support group. <3


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